DETECTION and preservation of the arteries related to the internal auditory canal are of basic importance for successful surgery on internal auditory canal pathological conditions. The aim of this article is to give a description of the arteries related to the internal auditory canal, as they appear through the transtemporal bone approaches; that is, through a lateral of lateroposterior approach (translabyrinthine or transsygmoid) and through an approach from above (middle fossa). The region examined is the internal auditory canal and the portion of the cerebellopontine space contiguous to the canal's opening. The branching of the internal auditory artery inside the canal will not be described. The data that follow are derived from a series of 100 human temporal bones which have been investigated from the standpoints of both descriptive and surgical anatomy. Detailed accounts have been reported elsewhere.1,2 Descriptive Anatomy Despite the great variability of the cerebellar arteries, there